


We're Gonna Need a Bigger Doggy Door

by sadlikeknives



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Crack, Gen, Parent Loki, Uncle Thor (Marvel)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-14
Updated: 2017-11-14
Packaged: 2019-02-02 00:58:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12716493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sadlikeknives/pseuds/sadlikeknives
Summary: Hela came across the beast in one of the gardens, curled into a ball with its nose tucked under its tail. "Hello," she said, sensing usefulness. "What's this?""That's, uh, Fenris," Skurge told her, eyeing the beast warily and trying to remember if the correct form of address was 'Prince' Fenris or not. "He's Prince Loki's son."Or, the one where Fenris is closer to his mythological origins but, if everyone's honest, takes after Uncle Thor more than anyone, and Mummy's Dead is the worst game he and Loki have ever played.





	We're Gonna Need a Bigger Doggy Door

**Author's Note:**

> Mythologically speaking, of course, Loki is Fenris' _father_ , but whatever. Details.

Hela came across the beast in one of the gardens, curled into a ball with its nose tucked under its tail. "Hello," she said, sensing usefulness. "What's this?"

"That's, uh, Fenris," Skurge told her, eyeing the beast warily and trying to remember if the correct form of address was 'Prince' Fenris or not. "He's Prince Loki's son." The beast had been depressed for a while, ever since Loki had—well, no, Loki hadn't been dead, had he? Skurge wondered if Fenris had known that.

"Are you, now?" she asked. "Hello, Fenris. I'm your auntie Hela." Fenris lifted his head, looking slightly hopeful. Perhaps he could tell that Hela bore some superficial resemblance to his mother, although dogs were colorblind so the fondness for green and black might be lost on him. His great tail thumped once against the ground, making the whole garden shake, and Hela smiled. "I'm so very pleased to meet you."

***

By the time Loki arrived on the bridge, things were thoroughly out of hand. "NO! FENRIS, NO! SIT! BAD BOY!" Fenris sat, right in the middle of the bridge. The Hulk flung himself at his head. Fenris knocked him back into the water with one shake, and returned his attention to Mummy. His tail thumped against the bridge with his joy, and several Asgardians screamed. A few of Hela's undead soldiers fell into the water. "Yes, my dearest, we don't have to play Mummy's Dead any more." That was good. Fenris had not liked Mummy's Dead. "But you have been _very naughty_ and Mummy is very cross with you." Fenris ducked his head and whimpered. Loki sighed and caved in, scritching the good spot on his cheek.

The Hulk leapt out of the water again, this time landing on the bridge behind him. Fenris bounded to his feet, growling, and Loki told him sternly, "Fenris, no. Hulk is our ally." Fenris tilted his head, not understanding 'ally.' "He's our...friend."

"HULK FRIEND?" Hulk repeated dubiously.

"Hulk friend," Loki agreed, looking like he couldn't believe he was saying the words. Then he smiled, pointed at Hela's troops, and ordered, "Fenris. Fetch."

When Thor found him, he took a moment out of the chaos to beam at Fenris. "Look at him, he's having such fun! He hasn't gotten to play like this in ages!" Loki had often been annoyed with how well his son liked Thor—how well everyone liked Thor—but it could not be denied that Thor adored him in return. "Watch this, watch this, I taught him a new game." He whistled, and when Fenris lifted his head from savaging one of Hela's undead soldiers, he called, "Fenris! Get help!"

Fenris threw his head back and let out a short, jubilant howl, a sort of, "AH-ROO!" and then whacked Hulk with one great paw and sent him flying at the enemy ranks.

"You taught my son Get Help?" Loki demanded, incredulous.

"He loves it!" Thor defended himself, beaming at the wolf. "Look at him! He's so happy."

It could not be denied that he loved it. Nor could it be denied that Hulk was apparently fonder of it than Loki had ever been. He was laughing. "I can't believe you!"

"Listen, I know what we have to do! But first we have to get everyone onto the ship."

Down the bridge, Hulk told Fenris, "GET HELP!"

"AH-ROO!" Fenris agreed, and sent him flying once more.

"He's saying 'Get Help!'" Loki realized.  His son was so clever.

The problem turned out to be getting Fenris onto the ship. "Is there another door?" Thor asked Korg, who had to admit he didn't know, but he could go check. Or he could have, if Fenris' shoulders hadn't been jammed in the opening.

"Just give him a minute," Loki said crossly. "He can do it. Look, he's already got his head in."

"He's not a cat, Loki."

"I _know_ he's not a cat, Thor. Just give him a minute."

"HULK HELP BIG DOG FRIEND," Hulk proclaimed, and started pushing on Fenris' rump. Inside the ship, they could hear his claws scrabbling on the decking for purchase. Someone screamed.

"Such dramatics, really," Loki said.

"Well, there's the pot calling the kettle black," Thor muttered.

"You said you had a plan."

"Yes," Thor said, and took a deep breath. "What if we were never meant to _prevent_ Ragnarok?"

***

It was long enough between Loki leaving and Surtur's appearance that Thor was beginning to get worried his brother had once again fucked off and left them to fend for themselves, but then there was a fire giant emerging from the suddenly-ruined palace, and Loki was running back to them, the reason for his delay apparent: lashed across his back was a stuffed squeaky bilgesnipe as big as, if not bigger than he was.

"Oh, did you really?" Thor asked.

"It's his favorite!" Loki defended himself.

It didn't matter, now. "To the ship!"

It turned out to be a good thing. Fenris was perfectly happy to lie in a corner the Asgardian refugees gave a wide berth, chewing on his squeaky bilgesnipe, for hours on end.

"I can't believe you let him think you were dead," Thor said. "I can believe you let me think you were dead, but _him_..."

Loki, who was sitting leaning against the wolf as he knitted a spell with wool and needles loaned to him by one of the refugees who'd had the foresight to pack essentials before going into hiding, told him, "Don't be ridiculous. Of course he noticed that his grandfather smelled like Mummy all of a sudden. I told him we were playing a game." He frowned slightly at his needlework. "A game called Mummy's Dead."

"That sounds like a terrible game."

"Yes, he seemed to think so, too." Fenris, in fact, looked slightly worried, and had stopped chewing on his bilgesnipe. "No, don't worry, we're not going to play Mummy's Dead any more." The squeaking resumed, and Loki inspected his stitching. "That should do it," he decided, and shook out the spell, letting it spread in a sparkling network until the few bits of yarn he'd started with had formed themselves into a nice, warm blanket for Fenris' bed, to protect him from the cold metal of the decking.

"You spoil him," Thor told him.

"Said the kettle to the pot." Loki sighed and told the wolf, "This would be much easier if you could get the hang of shapeshifting already." Frigga had always been sure he would, eventually. Odin had worried that his mind was getting to be too much of the wolf, the longer he stayed in the one form, but they would only really know if and when he took a more standard Asgardian shape. Even a more standard Frost Giant shape would have done.

"Just because you could before you were his age, doesn't mean you have to rush him," Thor said. They'd had this discussion many times. Which of them took which position did tend to vary, though.

"That's not what I meant. And anyway, Mother cast a spell on me, it's not the same thing."

"No, I don't think that's what happened at all." Loki looked at him curiously, and Thor shook his head. "Wishful thinking. I suppose we'll never know the details now, will we?" He stroked one hand down Fenris' hip. "He's a good boy."

"Yes," Loki agreed, his tone a little funny. "He is."

"Heimdall says that Hela told him she was his auntie." With Frigga dead, Thor and Odin gone, and Loki playing stupid games, Fenris must have been lonely for his family.

"Ah. Yes, that does explain a few things. She was a horrible woman," Loki told the wolf. "She was not your auntie, not like Thor is your uncle. And you'll never have to see her again."

Fenris, in reply, made his bilgesnipe squeak.

"I took something else from Asgard, you know," Loki told his brother.

"The Tesseract."

Loki nodded. "I didn't even have a scheme," he admitted. "I just thought it might be bad if it was right there when Surtur came."

"Have you come up with a scheme yet?" Loki shrugged. "Let me know when you do. Or try to kill me and I'll figure it out. Where are you hiding it?"

"That, brother, would be telling."

***

On the fourth day, they got Bruce back.

No one was quite sure how or why. He'd gone to sleep as the Hulk; he awoke as Banner. "This is good," Thor told him cheerily. "Your fears have proven unfounded."

"I—what--I have so many questions," Bruce said. "I—what happened to—and we're on a ship, and why is that giant dog here?"

"He's a wolf," Loki said, and, "He's my son," and he went back to the consultation he was holding with a couple of Asgardians who'd been traders in their time about where they could stop to resupply, the ship not having been prepared for this kind of long-term occupation by a large number of people when they stole it, and the options on the jump route to Earth that weren't in Kree space being somewhat thin.

"Okay, the wolf is—the wolf is your son. That doesn't make any sense."

"I'm a shapeshifter," Loki said. "Our mother's entire line are shapeshifters."

"You're adopted," Thor reminded him. "And I'm not a shapeshifter."

"You always were too much like Father."

"So he just—wants to be a giant wolf?"

"Oh, no," Thor said. "He hasn't learned to shift yet. So far he takes after his father. I told him Sexy Wolf was a bad idea, which you'd think he'd have learned after Sexy Horse, but _no_."

"I thought--" Bruce didn't know where to start. "I thought Loki was his father."

"I'm his _mother_ ," Loki said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "And I'm trying to work." Bruce looked like he had several questions, but didn't know which to ask first.

"I should probably tell Fenris he can't play Get Help with this version of you," Thor muttered, and wandered off to do just that.

"What's Get Help?" Bruce wanted to know, but like most of his other questions, it was destined to go unanswered.

***

When they finally arrived on Earth, after the...incident with Thanos, they found it much changed in their absence. Thor's attempt to explain the Sokovia Accords and their fallout to Bruce more or less failed, as he didn't understand it himself. There were several dignitaries, along with Tony and Natasha, there to greet them when the ship finally landed in Norway.

Tony stepped forward first as Thor stepped off the ship. "Hey, buddy, long time no—holy mother of pearl."

Fenris was attempting to squeeze through the hatch again.

"Excuse me for a moment," Thor said, and went back over to the opening, calling through a gap, "Did we never find another door?"

"Just give him a minute!" Loki called back peevishly. "He's tired of being cooped up."

Thor sighed, pasted a smile on, and explained to the humans in general, "My nephew, Fenris. Don't worry, your sun is safe, unless it doubles as a bouncy ball." A few of the Norwegians seemed to understand the reference, although for some reason it only seemed to alarm them more.

"Yeah, so, uh," Tony said, periodically shooting quick, nervous little looks at Fenris, still struggling to free himself, as he spoke, "We found the pieces of your hammer. We're pretty sure we got them all. I don't know if you can—fix that or what." Thor didn't know, either. Much of the old knowledge had been lost, but there were still master craftsmen he could consult. "Obviously everyone understands that your planet or whatever--"

"It wasn't a planet exactly, but continue."

"Blew up and you guys are refugees, and we're happy to work out agreements by which you can stay here on Earth."

"Except Loki," Natasha said. "They're not thrilled about Loki."

"As Midgardian authorities determined the appropriate course of action for Loki's crimes against your people was to remand him to Asgard's justice, I'm not really sure what else could be done with Loki," Thor said. "Asgard is here, now, in its people. I am not inclined to completely pardon my brother; however, we do not currently have anything that can function as a jail he cannot break out of, should he see fit. We're discussing several million hours of community service, perhaps. One moment." He called over his shoulder, "Do you think he's grown since he got _on_ the ship?" and Loki could be heard uttering several blistering oaths. "Language!"

"I'll language you!"

"That thing's still growing?" Tony asked incredulously.

"Of course, he's just a child. His mother is a Frost Giant. You didn't think they got the name for their average size, did you?" Again, the joke fell short. Midgardians, really.

"I thought _Loki_ was a--" Natasha cut herself off then, looking confused. That seemed to be pretty standard with Midgardians.

"Obviously there are several concerns interested in negotiating agreements regarding technology and resources--"

"We have no resources," Thor told Tony cheerfully. "We have our people."

"Right. But all of that can wait. Right now everyone just wants to help your people get settled in and off that—ship. Oh, shit." At that moment Fenris popped free like a cork from a bottle and bounded off across the field, as several of the dignitaries shouted and scattered. A handful of the braver Asgardian children, the ones with less watchful parents, followed him, and Fenris delightedly bounded sideways a few leaps, the earth shaking beneath his paws.

"Ah, it's good to be in the fresh air again," Thor said cheerfully. Something hit him bodily, and when he climbed to his feet he realized Loki had tossed out the squeaky bilgesnipe. He wound up for a full throw and called, "Fenris!" The great wolf turned, his ears pricking up. "Fetch!"

***

_Epilogue_

"Loki?"

"Yes, Sif?"

"You've received a message from the queen of someplace called Attilan."

"Never heard of it."

"Yes, well, they're interested in setting up a playdate between Fenris and something called...'Lockjaw?'


End file.
